I'm a fan of pc gaming, and have been for a couple of years now, and I have begun to notice that more often than not, for many players the vanilla version of their favorite game is not enough. For whatever reason, be it broken game mechanics or the burning desire to put one's mark on their favorite game, modding is a popular and almost always expected result of a game's being released.

I only really thought about it when I purchased the game Borderlands. For a long while many people I know had played the game and ranted and raved about it, so I eventually caved in and gave it a go during a sale on Steam. However, before I had even booted up the game for the first time, one of these people linked me to a site and told me to download what it provided. They explained that Borderlands, albeit a fun game, was a poorly executed console-to-pc port, and without this particular tool the game would be unplayable and--worst of all--unenjoyable. I found this a bit strange: if the game were so wonderful, why would it take my downloading a whole other device just to be able to play the game? If Borderlands were so broken on its own, were they lying when they were explaining to me just how great the game was?

Not to say Borderlands is an isolated case: the recent Bethesda titles (Oblivion and Fallout 3, in this case) were games I originally played on the console, then bought a while later through Steam. I found fairly quickly that the games, however fun they were when I had first played them on my xbox 360, were not quite so rosy in my eyes anymore. It only took a day or so worth of play with both titles to convince me to go rummaging through the internet for mods; and mod I did, with gusto. Looking at it in hindsight: I had paid to play these games in their original and unadulterated format. but I was modifying them into forms that I seriously doubt Bethesda had ever thought of or intended. With Borderlands, the mod was more of a tool than anything else, but the results are the same: a product changed in some way from its original intent.

So! My question to you, and the TL;DR version of this: Does modding cheapen the purchase of a game by in some way altering the material, or is it more of a tool for enhancing or repairing otherwise 'broken' or 'unfinished' material? Keep in mind: this is a question from the standpoint of a *purchase*, not the playing of the game.

Admittedly, the only mods I've ever used were the Christian Coder mod for Wizardry 8 and Brawl Minus, so I'm somewhat inexperienced...but the former added a lot to the game, and the latter is an absolute blast.

So! My question to you, and the TL;DR version of this: Does modding cheapen the purchase of a game by in some way altering the material, or is it more of a tool for enhancing or repairing otherwise 'broken' or 'unfinished' material? Keep in mind: this is a question from the standpoint of a *purchase*, not the playing of the game.

Modding is more modifying the game to your specifications, look at Dawn of War, while there were versions that fixed game issues, most mods where adding all this awesome stuff like new races or changing gameplay mechanics entirely, mods enhance the game very much to the point that the original isn't worth playing. It extends the lifetime of a game for one.

I usually play vanilla for the first playthrough of some games, then I go Mod-hunting. Mount and Blade has some positively amazing mods that completely alter the game for the better, and they receive full support from the oriinal develloper. Fallout and Oblivion are also games I heavily modded after the first play through, since there are a lot of things one can do with some of those mods.

Mods allow me to revisit past purchases and have a different kind of fun with them than I had with the release version.

I don't think they do, no. In some cases they're in fact necessary to ensure that the purchase you've made is a satisfactory one (read: the peerless UOP for Oblivion), and in many cases they can extend the lifetime of a game--and therefore the monetary investment said game represents--long after the vanilla content would otherwise have ceased to satisfy.

Modding is a selling point for me (and makes me wish I had the money for a pure gaming PC). You pay for a game, for instance Oblivion, then you get support from the developer (patches, DLC, expansions) and then you get an almost limitless amount of support on top of that. Mods that are like patches and mods that correct grammar and spelling errors and mods that fix flaws that escape the official patches.

I don't see how anyone can view extra support through a modding community (and this is even outside of the content adding mods that extend the world, in an albeit unofficial way) as anything but wonderful. But that's my opinion. xD

Depends on what the mods do for the game. Mods can extend a great deal of life to a game and show the creativity of the fans that support that game. Fallout New Vegas has a weapon upgrade system that was originally a mod for Fallout 3 developed by the community. Games with the right mod can be completely fresh and challenging experiences as fan made mods can often put in ideas that developers would never had time to put in on their own schedual. There are several Fallout 3 and Diablo 2 mods out there that i think improve the game a good deal.

that said, some mods are out there just to give players advantages or better gear earlier, those mods basically boil down to hacks and can turn a game boring in a hurry. This can be especially true for multiplayer games. I play Modern Warfare 2 online on my Pc and and I ran into a hacked server earlier today. i went from prestiege 9 lvl 45 to prestiege 10 lvl 70 with all emblems, titles, guns and attachments unlocked in a second due to that mod that host was using. and thats not the first time thats happend, ive only managed to prestiege legitimately about 4 times due to the frequency of hacked servers i run into there and now that Im lvl 70 10th, ive been cheated out of the satisfaction of fighting my way up there.

My first game I ever modded was oblivion. I rented it for the 360, but found that It wasnt all that enjoyable. But I happened across a blog on another site that had the ten most important mods for fixing TES4. So when I saw Oblivion GOTY at walmart for $20, a snatched it up, installed it, and went to town. By the time I was done I had about 6Gb of mods added to the game, and It didnt even play like the original. But all those mods change the game so much, that it wasnt the same game I baught. Problem was, Oblivion wasnt that great of a game vanilla, and I felt it was necessary. The only other game I modded was FO3, but that was more minor and cosmetic changes, with the only big one being a mod that made the Power armor more epic and rarer to find.

ehh..i love mods and all, but sometimes ppl rage and worship games FOR their mods, please, when you are describing a game, dont call it awesome unless you are talking about the vanilla game, and if you do call it awesome, be sure to include that the mods make the game/ fix the broken parts of it. so many people forget to include those minor details..

Agreed. Some games are great without mods. But many only become great with them. I can't think of a single reason I wouldn't want the option of installing mods.

I do, however, like to play through once without them. (Except Oblivion which required help for the awful character development. I mean jumping continuously and letting rats chew on my greaves to get a halfway decent stat increase... for every level? Seriously? Or NVN2, I mean where would we be with out TonyK?)

gmaverick019:ehh..i love mods and all, but sometimes ppl rage and worship games FOR their mods, please, when you are describing a game, dont call it awesome unless you are talking about the vanilla game, and if you do call it awesome, be sure to include that the mods make the game/ fix the broken parts of it. so many people forget to include those minor details..

On the same token, though...could a patch not be considered a mod as well? It is altering a vanilla game, adding, removing, or repairing elements in a way similar to a mod. It is, however, endorsed and developed by (at least I presume) the original creators of the game. I do, however, agree that some people should be more aware of what it is they are praising about the game in question, especially when they are discussing that game with possible buyers. Personally, I'd be more comfortable with a purchase if I knew what to expect out of a game, be it a solid vanilla product or a game rife with opportunities for modding.

I hate mods mostly. Though Id love the unnoffical Oblivion patch, but thats a fixer. But modding Oblivion, thats your own choice. Its when multiplayer it annoys me. *flashback to watchign friend play Halo 1 on PC online with snipers that shoot plasma grenades* Shiver...

Mods often give my old PC games a new lease on life. When I grow tired of the basic game, I go online and see what the modding community has cooked up. Depending on the genre, I gravitate towards different types of mods:

RTS games: new factions/new units (keeping it relatively balanced is a plus)RPG games: new quests/storylines/areas/professionsFPS games: custom single player levels/character models

EDIT: I should say I only download mods that alter gameplay for single player games. "Hacks" that give you an unfair advantage in multiplayer isn't my style.

Modding adds huge value to the games, there's no obligation to alter the original game if you don't want to, but doing so can breath new life into otherwise old or boring games. I wouldn't have ever bothered with half life 2 if not for the incredible modding community. If people didn't feel the need to modify games there would be no counter strike, team fortress or dystopia.

I was going to respond, but the poll results are pretty decisive, I don't think I can say anything that hasn't been said before. Mods are awesome, and also why the PS3 trumps the 360, because you can run mods on UT3.

Look at Firestorm over Kronus for example. And the mountains of custom made banners, symbols and skins that brighten up your game. Speaking of brightening up your game, they can also make the graphics better.

So! My question to you, and the TL;DR version of this: Does modding cheapen the purchase of a game by in some way altering the material, or is it more of a tool for enhancing or repairing otherwise 'broken' or 'unfinished' material? Keep in mind: this is a question from the standpoint of a *purchase*, not the playing of the game.

Some games are built around the fact that you can mod them. I mean Bethesda released construction set for Tes 3,4 and FO3. It doesn't cheapen their gamem, imo it is one of their main selling points. Now, if a game comes out half-finished etc. and the developers can't be bothered to fix the bugs... well, that's just stealing our money. A good example would be Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines. Really great game, it's propobly one of my top 10 all time favourite games, but the game crashed at a certain point. How cool is that? I pay money for a game that I can't finish? It was up to the modders to save the day (which they did).

Monkeyman8:Oblivion, proof that mods can make ANYTHING good, well except F3 I couldn't mod that enough to know that enjoyable.

Haha I also hate those two. I'm gonna mod Oblivion soon and see if I can actually enjoy it. With F3 i won't even bother :-)OT:I mod games only when I start my second playthrough. Mod's are great and can sometimes change the gameplay drastically. For instance I know Morrowind inside-out, so I'm gonna install some mods to change the game to get a little diffrent experience.

How could mods in general be bad? If you see a bad one or one that sounds like a cheat or outside the games canon you simply don't use it. If you see a good one it enchanced the game, and some mods are immense.

played a game and ever wondered why it has a item with stats so poor you can't reasonably use it or a quest reward that just looks nice and gets sold immediately? someone's probably fixed that (and someone else has probably turned it into a cheat item)

Dislike the levelling system? chances are it can be tweaked.

Ever played a game where half the content has been cut, the ending is rubbish and the thing is crippled with bugs? If the assets are still on the disk we can fix it ál a KOTOR2 and vampire:masquerade

Every game has features that stop it being perfect and the ability to polish them within the player community

No mods would mean no Nehrim for oblivion which I've been playing since it came out the other day and is, in fact, a far better game than the one it's made with.

edit: damn that preview button for being so close to post, that's twice I've hit the wrong one now.

Monkeyman8:Oblivion, proof that mods can make ANYTHING good, well except F3 I couldn't mod that enough to know that enjoyable.

You should see DaggerXL... someone's putting Daggerfall in a new engine using OpenGL.So far, it kicks ass. They're also making the game fully 3D, so you have enemies with 3D models now... can't wait until it's done.

How does it "cheapen" the game? The only way it might cheapen the game is by highlighting (and subsequently fixing) unfinished or broken aspects of a game, in which case a game is also cheapened by a negative review.

Basically, one big NO to your question. Mods only serve to enhance a game and they are completely optional. You lose nothing by ignoring them if they bother you. As for your own personal feelings about the whole thing, those are your problem and not any fault of the mods themselves.

Also, Borderlands is mediocre on any platform, and no amount of modding will change that...

I rarely enjoy mods that just alter the gameplay of the original game somehow, however. If they're fixing bugs that's one thing, but anything more usually detracts from the fiction of the game if not the gameplay. A mod that lets you dual-wield everything, for instance, is of no interest to me whatsoever.

Look at Firestorm over Kronus for example. And the mountains of custom made banners, symbols and skins that brighten up your game. Speaking of brightening up your game, they can also make the graphics better.

I just found that mod. It makes the game much more playable as IG. One of the most complete mods out there and it still isn't finished.

OT: Nope. Mods can enhance or even redirect the way I play a game and I find that awesome.